Friday, January 30, 2015

Note: Don't ever miss a post on Quick Brown Fox. Fill in your email in the box to the right under my bio, and get each post delivered to your Inbox. – Brian“Imagine, you live a life and lifestyle that
most people can only dream about. You have everything a woman could possibly
wish for and you’re happy and content. You’re married to your soul mate and
your relationship is rock solid.You’re
young, you’re beautiful and you’re happy. Life is good and you have no reason
to think that it could change in any way.

But change is what life is about. Change can happen at any minute of any given
day and change is not always for the better.

This is Stephanie’s story. The story of an ordinary stay at home mom,
living an ordinary life in an idyllic small-town environment in the heart of
Virginia.

Stephanie grew up in Canada. After the bitter loss
of the mother she adored, she and her husband, Mark, move to a tiny town in
rural USA. Getting used to small town life after having lived in the
cosmopolitan city of Toronto is not as difficult as she had anticipated. Her days revolve around her home, her husband
and her beautiful twins.

Mark is a partner in a prestigious and
enormously successful advertising firm, with its head office in Richmond.
Although he travels extensively, he’s always in touch with his family by phone
or email. Mark and Stephanie live in a lovely house, they have the BMW, they
have the money, and they have all the perks that come with a successful career.

Lorene

Through one of Mark’s clients, Ken, Stephanie
meets his wife, Antonia. Though they’re
entirely different in nature and background, the two women form a deep and
lasting friendship.

But not everything is what it seems and
suddenly, out of nowhere, life changes dramatically. Stephanie’s idyllic world
is turned upside down. Her future takes
a drastically different course. Her
hopes and aspirations are shattered and her love for her husband has to stand the
ultimate test.

Stephanie’s very life is threatened as she is
confronted with the unthinkable. Her only anchor is her deep friendship with
Antonia, who is by her side throughout her ordeal and beyond.

This is Stephanie’s story. A story of love and loss, of happiness and
deepest despair and, ultimately, a story of everlasting friendship.

Wednesday, January 28, 2015

The Kenyon
Review Short Fiction Contest opens Feb. 1st. Have a piece of unpublished short fiction of 1,200 words or
fewer? Submit to the Eighth Annual Kenyon
Review Short Fiction Contest any day during the month of
February.

The contest is open to writers who have not published a book of
fiction. The winning story and two runners-up will be published in the Kenyon Review, and the winning
writer will receive a full scholarship to the Kenyon Review Writers Workshop.

Entry fee of $18
includes a one-year subscription to KR
or extends your existing subscription by a year. Ann Patchett, celebrated author
of six novels, including Bel
Canto and State of
Wonder, will be the final judge. Go short and good luck!

The submissions link will be active February 1st to 28th. Contest
details here.

Breach, an upcoming publication of arts writing
based out of Vancouver, Canada, is currently accepting submissions for its
launch. An online platform for the examination of contemporary art practice as
it pertains to wider social issues, Breach seeks to interrogate the
intersections between the political and the cultural in a critical and
self-reflexive manner. Pretentious shit welcome, particularly essays, reviews, interviews, and other forms
that do not easily fit into conventional genres.

This is a perpetual free
contest for aspiring science fiction writers with a top prize each year of
$5,000. Established in 1983 by L. Ron Hubbard (science fiction author and
founder of Scientology), the contest claims, with considerable credibility, to
be "the most respected and significant forum for new talent in all aspects
of speculative fiction."

No entry fee is required, and all rights in the story remain the
property of the author. All types of science fiction, fantasy and dark fantasy
are welcome. No poetry or stories for children.

Entries may not have been previously published in professional media. To
be eligible, entries must be works of prose, up to 17,000 words in length.

The Contest is open only to those who have not had professionally
published a novel or short novel, or more than one novelette, or more than
three short stories, in any medium. Professional publication is deemed to be
payment, and at least 5,000 copies, or 5,000 hits.

There are three cash prizes each
quarter: a First Prize of $1,000, a Second Prize of $750, and a Third Prize of
$500, in U.S. dollars or the recipient's locally equivalent amount. In
addition, at the end of the year the four First Place winners will have their
entries rejudged, and a Grand Prize winner shall be determined and receive an additional
$5,000. All winners will also receive trophies or certificates.

Four deadlines a year: December 31, March 31, June 30, and September 30.Winners and finalists may be included in the
annual Writers of the Future Anthology.There's also an Illustrators of the Future
contest for new and amateur science fiction and fantasy artists.

This workshop will give you the
inside scoop on what gives a novel
best-selling potential. You’ll learn how to get readers emotionally involved in
your story, how to raise tension, control your pacing and keep your readers
turning the pages. But you won't just hear about some of the best secrets of
the trade; you'll learn how to apply them to give your own writing a sharp new
edge.

Workshop leader Brian Henryhas been a book editor and creative writing teacher
for more than 25 years. He publishes Quick Brown
Fox, Canada’s most popular blog for writers,
teaches creative writing at Ryerson University and has led workshops everywhere
from Boston to Buffalo and from Sarnia to Moncton. He has helped many of his students get published,
including guest speaker Kelley Armstrong...

Kelley Armstrong lives in Aylmer, south of London, Ontario,
with her husband and three children. She used to program computers and attend
Brian Henry workshops. Now she writes international bestsellers. Kelley has hit
the New York Time’s bestseller list with both her supernatural thrillers for
adults and her urban fantasy for teens.﻿

Laura Vandervoort and Greyston Holt

play Elena and Clayton on the set of Bitten

Kelley's principal publishers are
Random House Canada, Dutton and HarperCollins in the U.S. and Doubleday in
Britain. To date, she's published more than two dozen books, most
recently Sea of Shadows a fantasy novel for teens, Visions, a contemporary
Gothic for adults, and Otherworld Nights, a collection of short supernatural stories
for adults. Bitten, A TV series based on Kelley’s first 13
novels, started broadcasting last year.Kelley is preparing an entirely new talk for this workshop to give you her best insights into writing a gripping novel and will answer all your questions about her insights into the writing process and her experience becoming a successful author.

Fee: 40.71+ 13% hst = 46 paid
in advance by mail or Interac
or 43.36 + 13% hst = 49 if you wait to pay at the door

Monday, January 26, 2015

Dan
Balow is a 30-year veteran of the Christian publishing industry. He's now an agent with the Steve Laube agency and is looking for authors.

He was director of marketing for Tyndale House Publishers. Beginning in 1995, he led
the publisher’s marketing team for the successful Jerry Jenkins-Tim LaHaye Left
Behind series, becoming director of business development for the series (which
has sold more than 60 million copies to date). In 2002, he added the role of
director of international publishing until leaving Tyndale in 2006.

After stints as publisher for two audio book companies and
some publisher consulting, Dan joined the Steve Laube agency in 2013. His
publishing background in the business side rather than editorial is perhaps
best for authors who need help navigating the shifting sands of publishing. A
graduate of Wheaton College, he lives with his wife Carol, in Wheaton,
Illinois. Together they have four grown children and one grandchild.

Note: Don't ever miss a post on Quick Brown Fox. Fill in your email in the box to the right under my bio, and get each post delivered to your Inbox. – Brian

Olga Filina

Brian
Henry will lead "How to Get Published" workshops in Niagara on the Lake on Saturday, March 7, with literary agent Olga Filina of
The Rights Factory (see here) and in
Windsor on Sunday, May 31, with Martha Magor Webb of the Anne McDermid Agency
(see here).

Also,
Brian will lead a “Writing for Children & for Young
Adults” workshop with Anne Shone, Senior Editor at Scholastic Canada, on
Saturday, May 2, in Oakville (see here).

Other
upcoming workshops, include "Revising and Editing," Saturday,
Jan 31 in Oakville (here), “How to
Build Your Story,” Saturday, February 7 in Stouffville (here),
Saturday, February 28 in Collingwood (here),
Saturday, March 14 in Burlington (here),
Saturday, May 9 in London (here) and
Saturday, May 30 in Guelph (here), and“How to Make Your Stories Sizzle,”
Saturday, February 21 in Mississauga (here).

Weekly
courses: Whether you're looking for an introduction to creative
writing or you're getting your manuscript ready to submit to an agent, your
best bet is a weekly course. “Writing
Personal Stories,” begins Tuesday, January 27, in Oakville (see here).

Then the
spring classes start up in April, including “The Next Step in Creative Writing”
on Thursday afternoons in Mississauga (here)
and on Thursday evenings in Georgetown (here).

A fee of $25.00 (taxes included) for administration purposes is required
for each entry.

Prizes: $6,000 grand prize, $1,000 each for four runner-ups, publication
in enRoute and more

Creative Nonfiction includes memoir,
biography, humour writing, essay (including personal essay), travel writing and
feature articles. While the events must be real and the facts true, creative
nonfiction conveys your message through the use of literary techniques such as
characterization, plot, setting, dialogue, narrative and personal reflection.
In works of creative nonfiction, the writer's voice and opinion are evident.
The work should be accessible to a general reading audience (i.e., not written
for a specialized or academic audience).

Fourth Genre: Explorations in Nonfiction,a
journal devoted to publishing notable, innovative work in nonfiction. Given the
genre’s flexibility and expansiveness, we welcome a variety of works ranging
from personal essays and memoirs to literary journalism and personal criticism.
Published twice a year. Guidelines for submissions here.

Fourth Genre also calls
for submissions for the annual Steinberg Essay
Prize

The judge for our 11th annual Fourth Genre Steinberg
Essay Prize had been previously announced in Poets & Writers and
the Writers Chronicle as the essayist, editor, and beloved
teacher Judith Kitchen, who passed away in early November, to the great sadness
of her current and former students, friends, and the larger community of
essay-writers everywhere. (Read a brief piece here.)

We at Fourth Genre have
asked one of Judith’s former students, Kate Carroll de Gutes, to judge this
year’s contest in Judith’s spirit. We hope to receive an abundance of lyric
essays, but all forms and modes are welcome.

The author of the winning essay
receives $1,000; the winning entry will be published in Fourth Genre 18.1
(February 2016). Reading fee: $209 U.S.

Brian Henry has been a book editor, writer, and creative writing instructor for more than 25 years. He teaches creative writing at Ryerson University. He also leads weekly creative writing courses in Burlington, Mississauga, Oakville and Georgetown and conducts Saturday workshops throughout Ontario. His proudest boast is that he has helped many of his students get published.